A Very Good Friday

My wonderful father has once again saved the day. Since Daddy is a teacher, he had off for Good Friday, and he came over and literally transformed my yard. Granted it will only stay this way for a little while before the overgrowth once again takes over, but it looks (comparatively) great right now. First he taught me that the very old, very temperamental lawn mower I “inherited” has certain tricks in order make it start. Then he cut the grass. Then he used the weed eater to do edging. Then he cut all the weeds in the driveway. And the worst part came—literally digging out massive weeds in the part of the back yard where I couldn’t afford to put down sod. Daddy would dig up the big ones (I’m talking as high as my waist and deeply entrenched) and I would pull the smaller ones and then haul away the big ones that he had already dug up. It’s amazing—we actually filled up an entire enormous Orleans parish green monster garbage can. After that, my father literally mowed over the weeds. Until I can come up with a better and affordable solution, this is the way it has to be. By the way, the first picture on the top left is what my yard looked like when I first moved into my house at the end of June 2007. Sometimes it’s hard to see progress until you look back on what you started with. (This statement seems slightly dumb, but I feel it’s true. We so often forget what things looked like when we began a project.)

Now for the really fun stuff. 😉 I found a large piece of wooden lattice in the trash pile on the side of the road a few blocks from my house. I acquired it and am using it to cover the one piece of my yard that isn’t fenced. It will also serve as a climbing space for the beans once they start sending off shoots. My father hammered bamboo sticks into the ground and attached the lattice to these sticks as well as the old shed, etc. Now it won’t fall over every time the wind blows.

In other news, my tulips have been blooming. It’s really nice to feel like something I planted is actually producing. So often I manage to just kill things. I brought one of the tulip blooms into the house on Wednesday, and it’s still looking beautiful. My new goal is to always have at least one fresh flower (preferably from my own garden) in a vase on the dining room table.